Sweden: Neuville digs the hole on Breen

Despite good resistance from Craig Breen (Citroën) which has chosen to only carry one spare wheel compared to two for most competitors, Thierry Neuville (Hyundai) a pris le large sur la C3 WRC. From a lead of 45"9 over the Irishman at the break, the Belgian moved to 18"8 ahead after notably signing two consecutive scratches on the last two courses (Hagfors and Vargasen).

The fight for third place is still hotly contested between Hyundai drivers Andreas Mikkelsen and Hayden Paddon. The Norwegian gained some air against the New Zealander with a little more than seven seconds ahead, but the Scandinavian remains around twelve seconds behind the first Citroën.

Mads Ostberg (Citroën) complète toujours le Top 5 même si le Norvégien a perdu le contact avec les Hyundai. Le pilote nordique précède toujours les Toyota d’Esapekka Lappi et de Jari-Matti Latvala, même si le premier Finlandais est revenu à moins de neuf secondes de la cinquième place.

Teemu Suninen (M-Sport) est remonté au huitième rang en profitant notamment des malheurs d’Ott Tänak (Toyota). The Estonian was level with Jari-Matti Latvala until he went off the road following an incident with Kris Meeke's Citroën on SS13. The Northern Irishman, who was in tenth place, made a mistake and found himself the victim of a loss of power before letting the Toyota driver pass by stopping on the side of the road. However, the two cars touched and the Estonian fell back to ninth place after losing more than a minute.

Meeke (and Breen) with problems in SS13 now live on https://t.co/twccZ0hRvh @RallySweden #WRCLive #WRC pic.twitter.com/W3UMdWZSbJ

— WRC (@OfficialWRC) 17th February 2018

Kris Meeke had to dismount at the end of the special, allowing Sébastien Ogier (M-Sport) to finally enter the Top 10 while still ahead of his teammate Elfyn Evans.

Takamoto Katsuta (Ford) remains at the head of WRC 2 in 12th place in the general classification, with a dozen seconds ahead of Pontus Tidemand (Skoda). Ole Veiby (Skoda) follows in third place with a similar gap on the Swede. Among the R5s, reigning World RX champion Johan Kristoffersson (Skoda) moved up to sixth place.

In WRC 3 and JWRC, it is still local driver Denis Radström who leads the category with almost 17 seconds ahead of his compatriot Emil Bergkvist. The French Terry Folb is at the foot of the provisional podium just over a minute behind the German Julius Tannert. Jean-Baptiste Franceschi occupies sixth place in the JWRC (7th in WRC 3) just over half a minute behind Irishman Callum Devine.

The second stage of Rally of Sweden will end with two short stages. The Karlstad super special will be contested from 17:45 p.m. The last routes of the day will be followed live with our live text.